Dragon In The North
by FireandBloodandKittens
Summary: Daenerys arrives in Winterfell-to woo the Northerners, to explore the hidden past she shares with the Starks...and to glimpse an uncertain future. THANK YOU to everyone reading this! You're gorgeous, lovely people to indulge my fanfic fantasies. Disclaimers: A Girl Owns Nothing. Thank the Old Gods and the New for A Song of Ice and Fire Wiki.
1. Chapter 1

Shouts echoed around the vast Hall, now filled to capacity with the Northern nobles. Lords, Ladies and bannermen had all heeded the ravens calling them back to Winterfell to greet the returning King in the North and the Dragon Queen who journeyed with him.

"My Lords and Ladies…" Jon raised a hand to quiet the din as he paced in front of the heavy table at the front of the room. "I am indeed grateful to be back home at Winterfell. And I am honored to present…Daenerys Stormborn of House Targaryen…" he gestured to the willowy silver-haired woman who now approached to take her place beside the earnest young man.

"Khaleesi…from across the sea…" he continued, hesitatingly. He was sure he saw gentle laughter in her violet eyes as she gave a slight shake of her head, the bells braided into her hair tinkling softly.

He gave a brief nod and a smile played upon his tense lips for a moment. "She _has earned_ many titles," he finished simply. "And today, she is our Ally against the first, the last, the only enemy in the Great War to Come."

A roar of voices swelled again, laden with cheers that momentarily drowned out the icy wail of the white winds swirling thick snow around the castle walls.

Daenerys surveyed the Northerners. She did not yet know all their names or Houses, but she knew their reputation for stubbornness, for fierce pride and for loyalty. She had become acquainted with all these qualities in Jon.

She glanced back at the pale, sturdy figures arrayed at the table behind her. Sansa, Lady of Winterfell, was an auburn haired beauty who wore her nobility as easily as her rich but simple gowns. Her heart shaped face, the only feature she shared with her older half brother, seemed perpetually calm, though Daenerys sensed the young woman had become exceptionally adept at concealing her emotions-a skill cultivated by most women who wished to survive and one readily recognized by the Dragon Queen. Arya, the younger sister, appeared at once wary and dangerous. Her left hand rested on the hilt of a dagger that Daenerys had earlier recognized as Valyrian steel, while her large, Stark eyes calmly scanned the room, warming slightly when they met Jon's. Bran, their pale, strange little brother, seemed to tower over them, even as he gazed serenely from his wheeled chair. Daenerys felt for the crippled boy, but something about him unnerved her, just as he seemed to unnerve his brother and sisters. Bran did not so much look _at_ others as t _hrough_ them. When Daenerys first met him, he turned his vacant, expressionless eyes upon her and remarked, "The caves under Dragonstone do not tell even half the story."

Jon had not mentioned the crude art he had discovered depicting the creation of the White Walkers. As far as Daenerys knew, no one in Westeros had discovered it.

How on earth Bran could have known this, no one could say. Daenerys had experienced more than her share of magic in the world. In Essos, she had seen visions which she did not yet understand. She had heard prophecy. She had watched humans tragically tinker with life and death. And she had walked out of a funeral pyre with the first dragons to draw breath in over a thousand years. Daenerys sensed that Bran Stark knew more than all of them, though he spoke the least.

Sansa, Arya, Bran. Together with Jon, the last surviving Starks. The young queen had heard snippets of the legendary tragedies that had befallen them since Robert's death. And she knew their troubles began long before that, when her own father had slaughtered their grandfather and uncle and her older brother had raped and killed their aunt Lyanna…all before she or the Stark children sitting before her were ever born.

Daenerys respected their resilience and she envied their tight bonds. She was vaguely fascinated by families, especially siblings. Growing up in exile with no parents and no siblings save for her monstrous brother, she could not quite imagine what is was like to have a home, a shared foundation of memory…to gently squabble with a little sister over the last lemon cake…to run shrieking and laughing through your family's grounds with a doting older brother. She knew that whatever strength they shared, whatever force had kept them alive and brought them back home to each other-it would be needed in the coming struggle.

"My Lords and Ladies…" Daenerys began, regarding the assembly and commanding the room with an easy charm and hard earned authority.

"All my life I have heard stories of the North's honor, your strength, your courage." Not strictly true, given she had been raised on Viserys' rantings about the Starks' role in Robert's Rebellion, but discretion was the better part of diplomacy. "The stories did not do you justice." True enough.

"I have seen the enemy." Daenerys unconsciously clenched her fists as she remembered the hordes of White Walkers and wights swarming below her and Drogon as she struggled to rescue Jon and the others. She would never forget the screams of her dragon Viserion, her ivory and golden child, as he fell from the sky and plunged into the dark, icy lake, shattered by the Night King's lance.

She drew a deep breath. "I have seen the enemy," she repeated. "And I stand with the North-with all of Westeros-in the Great War to Come. For if we lose this War, we lose the world. I will support and defend you with my armies, with my dragons and with my life."

Again, the Northerners roared their approval. Daenerys was gratified by their enthusiasm, but watched carefully as Jon stepped forward, knowing that the most difficult part was coming next.

"The Queen told you she had seen the enemy, but she did a great deal more than just observe." Jon surveyed his siblings and then looked out upon his bannermen, waiting for silence.

"When I departed for Dragonstone to meet Daenerys Targaryen, I didn't know what to expect and I didn't much care. We had all heard the stories," he glanced evenly at Daenerys, "of the silver haired girl from across the sea…the Mad King's last child and her dragons." Jon returned his intense dark eyes to his nobles. "What I found, was a strong woman who had survived the destruction of her family, and a life in exile. She had been sold like chattel into a forced marriage, and eventually lost her husband and her child to dark forces. She has suffered and survived, as we all have, and has tried to make it mean somethin', as we all have." Jon paused and noticed Sansa's large gray eyes fixed on the Queen, shining with a newfound curiosity.

He nodded to the 10 year old head of House Mormont-the tiny and fierce Lady Lyanna. "Ser Jorah Mormont told me how he watched Daenerys walk into an inferno and walk out unscathed with three newborn dragons." Jon looked to the nobles clustered in the back of the Hall. "Her advisors recounted how they eagerly _chose_ to join her service, after she laid waste to their cities in Slaver's Bay, freeing them, along with every other slave within the cities' walls." He met the Queen's gaze. "Daenerys laid a fearsome punishment on the slave masters but, as is her custom, forbade her men to rape the women or harm the children. I learned how she escaped a band of hostile Dothraki, destroying her captors and winning their armies to her command."

The young man paced deliberately now, his voice rising. "At Dragonstone, Daenerys heard my warnings about the White Walkers. She opened the pits and set her own men to mining dragonglass for the fight. And when we were trapped on that ice Beyond the Wall, she saved us." Jon met Daenerys' eyes again. He spoke to her, his voice even and deliberate. "Without hesitation, and at terrible cost to herself, she personally travelled half the continent to fly into that swarming mass of death and save us."

Silence hung in the Hall, heavy and breathless, as all eyes flickered between the two figures commanding the room.

"Daenerys Stormborn has proved herself to be a fearless warrior, a just ruler, a compassionate defender of the people…and a woman of honor. If we are to defeat the enemy which neither knows nor cares about names, titles or Houses, then we-all of Westeros-must stand together, united as one people, under one ruler. Daenerys may claim that position by her name, but all that matters, is that she has earned it by her deeds."

Jon paused and gazed at his people. "I have already bent the knee to Daenerys. I have pledged to her my service and my life, as the rightful Queen of the Seven Kingdoms…of all of the Seven Kingdoms"

Murmurs rippled round the vast room like wildfire. Heavy shadows shifted on the torch lit walls as the pale, fierce Northerners glanced at each other, and finally back to their King.

Jon looked to his sisters and brother, and then faced the nobles. "You are free men and women of the North. You swore yourselves to me, but neither I nor anyone else can swear you to another. But as the eldest of the Stark blood, whom you proclaimed as your King, I do _ask_ you, to follow me and swear allegiance to Daenerys-our greatest hope in the gathering darkness."

After a moment's pause, the room burst with the clatter of wooden benches scraping against stone and alarmed voices rising in confusion and protest.

"How can you ask us to bend the knee to a stranger, practically a foreigner?" cried Lord Wyman Manderly, incredulously. "We've had enough of the Iron Throne and its intrigues," he finished, his great, fleshy face growing red with frustration.

"Aye," chimed in Lady Sybelle Glover. "I do not question the Dragon Queen's courage or honor. But we cannot submit ourselves to Southron interests once more. The North must govern the North!"

Cries of "Hear, Hear!" echoed Lady Glover's words.

"There will be no North after the Long Night falls!" The high, firm voice of Lady Lyanna rang out clear as a bell over the din. The girl rose, and stepping up onto the bench, turned to face her countrymen. "Who here rallied to Stannis Baratheon to oppose the Lannisters?" Lyanna's shrewd eyes narrowed as she scanned the somber faces awash in speckled light from the torches. "Who, once before, was ready to submit to Dragonstone to destroy a common enemy?" Lords Burley and Liddle shifted uncomfortably. Big Bucket Wull dropped his eyes. Others fell silent as they gazed at the young Bear.

"We need Daenerys and her dragons," Lyanna said simply. "And I swore to follow Jon Snow as King in the North, as did all of you. Do you trust our King?" She surveyed the silent faces around her. "I do." Her voice rising, she continued, "Will you honor your promise to follow him?" She paused. "I will," she intoned solemnly.

Lyanna looked from Jon and Daenerys. "I have pledged House Mormont to your service, Jon Snow. As you have pledged yourself to Daenerys Stormborn, a proven leader devoted to the defense of her people, so I do as well."

"Daenerys," As Lyanna addressed her directly, the Dragon Queen recognized the same the same slight lift of the chin that she had seen in Lyanna's cousin Jorah, and the same stubborn devotion in the child's intense, inky dark eyes. "I declare to you the allegiance of House Mormont, and recognize you as the rightful Queen of the Seven Kingdoms of Westeros. I pledge to you my service and my life, in War and in Peace, in this Winter…and in the Summer to come." As her voice broke ever so slightly on her final words, Lyanna knelt, her eyes never leaving Daenerys'.

Slowly, the noise of gentle, muffled thuds filled the Hall as the assembled Northerners rose to their feet and dropped to their knees.

Daenerys and Jon turned at the sound of rustling behind them, to see Sansa and Arya stand and bow their heads to the Dragon Queen. Bran remained motionless, but his strange, unnerving gaze held Daenerys for a moment. She felt a slight shiver sweep over her as she glimpsed…something…at once familiar and foreboding in his enigmatic eyes.


	2. Chapter 2

Thick snow crunched under Arya's boots as she strode out of the courtyard and across the grounds. She needed open space to train with her new dragonglass-tipped spear fresh out of the foundry. Arya was used to working close up, with her Needle or daggers. Finding the balance and range of a spear would take time, but Arya was patient and deliberate…with the art of combat, anyway.

The wiry young woman smiled to herself, recalling how impatient she had been as a child with sewing and dancing…and her mother's gentle exasperation with her youngest daughter's indifferent ineptitude at the feminine arts. For about the hundredth time, in what felt like as many years, Arya wondered if her mother would be proud that she had finally found her skill with a Needle. She wondered if Catelyn would delight in her daughter's water dancing.

A great roar snapped her from her reverie and Arya whipped her head up to see Drogon, the Dragon Queen's great beast, soaring overhead. The Stark girl, jaded and worldly though she was, stopped and watched breathlessly as the creature circled once, then landed with surprising grace on the snowy field.

The roiling mass of black scales shuddered slightly, as the dragon lowered its leathery, inky wings, making a sharp contrast against the surrounding sea of white.

Drogon was close to Arya; close enough for her to see his breath steam in the icy air and to watch the Dragon Queen herself slip easily from his shoulders to the ground.

"Lady Arya." Daenerys approached the younger woman; snowflakes swirled around the willowy, silver-haired woman, settling on her dark furs. "I hope I didn't startle you."

"Nothing startles me," Arya shot back, more sharply than she intended. "Your Grace."

The youngest Stark daughter did not yet know how she felt about Daenerys Targaryen. As Jon had asked, Arya, along with the rest of the North, had sworn fealty to the Queen, transferring her allegiance from Jon to Daenerys. Arya loved and trusted her older half brother, perhaps more than any other person in the world. If he (and that little firecracker Lady Mormont) were convinced that bending the knee to Daenerys would save them, then ultimately, that was good enough for Arya.

Yet, she did not know this strange woman who was raised in exile. None of them did, except for Jon. And Arya saw the way he looked at Daenerys. Arya could understand the way he looked at Daenerys. The violet-eyed beauty's charms, along with her illustrious reputation, were quite irresistible. But Arya was wary by nature and she was especially wary of any woman who might hold her brother's heart. Jon was older than Arya, but in many ways, more naïve. He was certainly more honorable. Arya knew that honor was dangerous. And so she walked toward Daenerys, with snow dusting her hair and with caution and curiosity warring within her.

"I watched you sparring with Lady Brienne yesterday. You don't move the way Westrosi knights do." Daenerys smiled admiringly. "Where did you learn to fight like that?"

"I learned many things in many places," Arya replied quietly. "But I learned to water dance from my Braavosi dancing master."

Puzzled, the Queen furrowed her brow as she gazed at Arya.

"It was a long time ago, Your Grace," the girl finished.

"Well, your…dancing master…must have been a remarkable teacher," Daenerys said gently.

"He was," Arya said, a pang of sorrow piercing her like ice as she remembered the last time she ever saw Syrio Forel, as he fought off a pack of Lannister guards, buying her time to flee and saving her life. "But he never taught me to wield one of these," she observed, hefting the large spear in her hand.

Arya saw a flash of Drogon's blood red eye. His screech pierced the air and her pounding heart flooded her ears as Daenerys commanded, "DROP THE SPEAR!"

Automatically, Arya's hand opened and the weapon fell with a soft thud into the snow. At the same instant, the Queen whipped around to the beast and murmured softly to him, caressing his scales, now sparkling like black diamonds from the icy snowflakes.

Instinct and training had taught Arya when to fight and when to stay perfectly still. She stayed perfectly still while the beast quieted and Daenerys turned back to face her.

"I'm sorry. Seeing you raise the spear—he thought you were threatening me." Daenerys remembered the scorched fury Drogon had unleashed when Jaime Lannister had charged at her with a lance. "And it may have reminded him…" Her violet eyes clouded with grief. "It may have reminded him of the lance that shattered his brother, Viserion," the Queen finished. She looked back to her dark dragon. "He's calm now. He won't hurt you."

Perhaps so, but all the same, Arya continued to stay perfectly still while she spoke. "He's much bigger than the old ones."

Daenerys turned to Arya. "The old ones?"

"In King's Landing, when I wasn't training, I liked to wander the Red Keep. Once I got lost in that dark room filled with ancient dragon skulls." Arya's dark eyes flickered to Drogon, icy steam billowing from his nostrils. "Some were so large I could stand inside the jaw and not touch the sides or top. Others were mounted on the wall…"

Daenerys' eyes widened and she shivered slightly in the biting cold. "My brother used to talk about them. He said they were enormous…terrifying. And I saw them myself…" she hesitated, unsure how to explain that she had glimpsed her family's dragons' skulls in King's Landing, while she was in the House of the Undying in Qarth. "I saw them in a vision," she said simply. It was the truth.

Arya gave no particular thought to the Queen's remark. Arya had learned to collect faces overseas and now she stood in her childhood home, feet away from a dragon which would soon be battling the army of the Others, led by the Night King. Why shouldn't Daenerys Targaryen have visions? The dark haired girl took a deep breath and cautiously moved forward, taking care to step quietly and slowly through the shallow drifts of snow.

Drogon was indeed calm now. As both women watched him intently, he blinked slowly, his enormous eye shuttering once, twice. He slapped his long, powerful tail down into the snow and dragged it side to side through the powder, seeming to delight in the sensation of the fluffy cold crystals against his body.

As Arya watched the creature, she couldn't help but smile. She appreciated the rather absurd display of its power coupled with its unconscious whimsy. "I'm sorry about your other dragon." She remembered how devastating it was to lose her Nymeria so long ago.

Daenerys' mouth tightened in a hard line; her violet eyes misted slightly, then hardened. "I will destroy the Night King—at any cost," she said quietly. "But I do not regret saving your brother—and the others," she finished, meeting the Stark girl's inscrutable gaze.

"Jon trusts you with much more than his life," Arya said evenly. "He trusts you with the lives of his family, of his people."

"And I trust him with the lives of mine." Daenerys paused and laid her hand on Drogon's massive jaw. She watched Arya carefully. "Would you like to touch him?"

Arya's eyes widened slightly as she looked from the silver haired Queen to the ebony behemoth. She advanced carefully. Drogon blinked and turned, catching the girl in his red gaze. Arya could feel his hot breath melting the snow and ice clinging to her jacket. She stared into his massive crimson eye and saw herself reflected in the inky pupil. Arya imagined she could see back through the ages to Aegon's dragons…and to the creatures now reduced to dusty skulls…and finally to Drogon himself, raining fire on the army of the dead…her brother huddled on an ice floe.

Arya stretched out her hand and brushed his scales with her fingertips. They were as hard and glassy smooth as obsidian. She marveled at the sensation, realizing that truly, the beasts were living, heaving, breathing dragonglass.

"Trust is more rare than dragons; and it will be even more valuable in the Great War to Come," Daenerys observed. "I did not grow up with a large family…or a loving family." Her breath hung in the frigid air as she gave a mirthless laugh. "Or any family…save for my older brother, whose temperament most people compared to that of Joffrey Baratheon."

Still caressing Drogon, Arya looked to the pale woman, this time with genuine feeling. "I wouldn't wish that on anyone."

Daenerys smiled slightly. "I made my family …out of fire and blood." She looked at Drogon, her hand moving gently across his neck. "My dragons were born after I took them into the flames. And when I walked into that fire with my dragon eggs, I had to trust…something…some ancient power…some destiny I didn't yet understand. My people-Missandrei, Grey Worm and all the others-they joined me after I killed the slavers who held them in bondage. When they chose to follow me, they had to trust my leadership…my honor…and our ability to forge a shared destiny."

The Queen gazed evenly at Arya. "We will have to trust each other in the coming struggle." She suddenly smiled and looked up at wonder as the chilly flakes began to swirl around them; Arya realized with a start that Daenerys was as mesmerized by the Northern snow as Arya was by the massive dragon undulating under her hand.

"Stark and Targaryen," Daenerys continued softly. "Ice and Fire." Drogon hissed quietly, his steamy breath warming Arya through her furs. "Ice and Fire," she repeated, more quietly, almost to herself, her violet eyes now far away. "I still don't understand everything I saw. But I do understand that, by either fate or design, we share a destiny." The woman looked back to Arya. "We must fight. We must win. And we must trust each other."

The Stark girl met her gaze without expression. "I trust Jon. And Jon trusts you." She arched her brow. "And it seems Drogon now trusts me." She looked back at the great dragon, now pressing itself against Arya's hand, as a cat would rub its head against her hand.

Daenerys broke into a wide grin. "And do you trust him?"

Before the girl could comprehend what she was proposing, the Queen turned and stepped lightly onto her dragon's shoulder, murmuring to him softly. She turned back and reached out her hand to Arya.

The young woman gulped quietly. She very, very carefully retrieved the precious dragonglass spear from the snow, and discreetly slipped it into the case on her back. Arya contemplated Daenerys' Targaryen's outstretched hand. She let her eyes wander from Drogon's jaw up, up, up to the Dragon Queen's face, already perched high above. Her violet eyes bloomed with determination, encouragement…and-Arya detected-challenge.

Her skin was hot, almost feverish, against Arya's chilly hand. The Stark girl clasped Daenerys' hand tightly as she found her footing on Drogon's slick scales and scrambled up his broad, powerful shoulders.

Arya had no sooner settled herself upon Drogon's back, wrapping her hands tightly around the tough ridges dotting his hide, than the dragon spread its massive wings, beating them against the frigid air. Arya watched the snowy ground recede beneath them as they lifted up and adrenaline flooded her brain, making her feel delirious and more alive than she had at any time in her short, strange life.

Bran had rambled some nonsense about flying…about seeing the Raven…or being the Raven. As Arya scanned the fiery tops of the ancient weirwoods and watched Drogon's shadow darken the bright snow blanketing her home, Arya wondered if Bran's flying felt anything like this pitching, roiling, terrible exhilaration.

Daenerys was saying something; something Arya could not hear over the pounding of her heart and the rushing of the wind. It didn't matter. Arya felt Drogon respond to the Queen's commands. She felt Daenerys pressed protectively against her. Arya felt their bonds—dragon and rider; Ice and Fire; Stark and Targaryen. She did not understand this destiny, but in that moment…for that moment, she trusted it.


	3. Chapter 3

Footfalls echoed through the cold stone chamber; the muffled sound of heavy skirts dragged across the floor.

Expressionless, unseeing eyes watched the women, as Sansa strode the now familiar passages of her family's crypts. As a child she had rarely visited these dank halls housing the Stark dead going back generations. She had found them gloomy and boring. Anyway, she had known _she_ would never end up here. She would marry the charming, handsome prince and make an elegant, sophisticated life in the capital, far from the rough and rural North; she would give her devoted husband many beautiful, golden-haired children and at the end of a long and happy life, be laid to rest by his side in Kings Landing, in the Light of the Seven.

The auburn-haired woman winced inwardly at the vacuous foolishness of her youth. She glanced at the still, stone figures half hidden in shadow and wondered, as she always did, if any other Starks had ever been so naïve; or if any had ever been so grateful to be back home in Winterfell.

Daenerys watched Sansa carefully. Tyrion had told the Dragon Queen a bit of the Stark girl's life in Kings Landing; she knew the woman carried a heavy burden.

Sansa's steps slowed as they rounded a corner and she found the faces of her family.

The countenance of Ned's statue, sturdy and solid, bore little resemblance to her father but she took comfort gazing upon it nonetheless. Until Arya had returned, Sansa had imagined she was the last Stark to ever see Ned alive. She found further comfort knowing that, in some way, she was not as alone as she had felt, in the midst of that great baying crowd, when Ser Ilyn Payne sliced off their father's head.

Ned was flanked by the tall figure of Sansa's eldest brother, Robb, who along with their mother, had been slaughtered in the cruelest massacre in Westerosi memory, and by her youngest brother, Rickon, only a child when he was cut down by her sadistic husband, Ramsay Snow. Two great stone direwolves guarded the boys in death. Grey Wind sat upright at Robb's side, his bearing as regal as his master's. Rickon's cold fingers tangled deep into the unruly matted fur of Shaggy Dog, a beast as large as the child, with the same wild, wary eyes.

Daenerys gazed at the statutes, particularly Ned, with a somber curiosity. "Your father was a great man. And a good one," she observed quietly. "When Robert sent assassins to kill me and my unborn child, your father defied him to try and save me."

Sansa furrowed her brow and looked at the silver-haired woman in surprise.

"Lord Varys told me." Daenerys explained. "It seems your father quarreled with Robert over the matter and quit the Small Council for a time."

The pale woman smiled with satisfaction and glanced back to Ned's tomb. "That sounds like him." She absently traced Rickon's hair with her fingers. "I didn't know Father had trouble with the Small Council before…"

The Dragon Queen waited, watching Sansa.

"…before he discovered Cersei's secret…before Littlefinger betrayed his trust…before the council imprisoned him and let Joffrey kill him," she finished without emotion.

Daenerys reluctantly voiced the question now pressing on her mind. "Do you think his refusal to harm me helped turn the council against him?"

Sansa regarded the woman carefully. "No," she assured her. "My father was doomed the moment he confronted Cersei with the truth about her children," she finished with a bitter laugh. The younger girl pursed her lips and shook her head slowly, recalling snatches of overheard conversations, Court gossip which she had turned over in her mind a hundred times. "Besides Robert, I don't think anyone believed you posed a threat at the time. No one expected you to return to Westeros." Sansa smiled ruefully. "No one ever expects anything of women, do they?"

Daenerys recalled the shocked face of Kranznys mo Nakloz, when she turned Drogon on the slave master and liberated the Unsullied, triggering the sack of Astapor; she remembered facing down the hostile khals who had likewise tried, and failed, to enslave a dragon. "No," the Queen agreed, smiling. "No one ever does."

"Don't make the same mistake with Cersei," Sansa warned, her voice steely and calm as she met Daenerys' violet eyes. "She is clever and ruthless…and manipulative. She will welcome the Long Night, surrender the Seven Kingdoms to the Others and rule as the Night Queen before she will submit to you." The Stark girl glanced briefly at her father's statue before continuing quietly, "Cersei is the best player I've ever seen. She would have done anything to protect herself and her children."

"Well, she has no children now," Daenerys observed simply, her breath hanging briefly before her face as she hugged her fur cloak closer about her shoulders.

"That makes her desperate and even more dangerous," Sansa shot back, her voice echoing off the Stark tombs. "You don't know her, and neither does Jon. And Tyrion cannot understand her, not completely. He cannot understand what it is to be a woman married off against your will, hoping for the best, only to realize your husband is a lecherous drunk…or far, far worse. To be dismissed and silenced, to be denied power over your own life, your own body…to lose your children one by one…" The auburn-haired woman inhaled deeply, drinking in the cold air, choosing her words carefully. "I lived with her. I observed her. I learned from her." Sansa laughed harshly. "She was a most cruel teacher but an effective one." She looked back to Daenerys. "I do not sympathize with Cersei's actions. But I can understand her." She tilted her head slightly as she regarded the Dragon Queen. "And I think you can too. She has lost everything, except the power she had longed for and had been denied her entire life. She will go down fighting to keep it and she will take the whole world with her if she must."

Daenerys met Sansa's gaze. "I understand, I do." Firelight from the torches played across her features and shimmered like gold in her silver hair. "Once we defeat the Night King, Cersei will round on us before the last wight has fallen. I know that. We will be ready for her."

The Lady of Winterfell raised an eyebrow, thinking of her half-brother Jon and his naïve nobility. He knew Cersei was very dangerous but after the parley in King's Landing, he seemed content enough to ally with her forces in the Great War to Come. He trusted her to see reason, to set aside personal ambition to secure the common good. Jon was so very like their father.

Reading her thoughts, the older woman reiterated, "We will be ready for her. _I_ will be ready for her."

"Is that a promise or a plan?" Sansa pressed.

"A promise of a plan," Daenerys countered. "And a promise that after we defeat the Others and Cersei and remake the world, you will not be dismissed and silenced, Lady Sansa. And neither you, nor I, nor any woman, will be sold into marriage against her will."

Sansa's wide eyes shone in the darkness, reflecting a longing tinged with doubt. She paused before sweeping past her father and brothers and stepping through the arch leading deeper into the gloom of the crypts. Sansa turned back to the Dragon Queen. "That is a lovely vision, Your Grace." She smiled at Daenerys, unconvinced but unwilling to disabuse the Queen of her aspirations to a better way of life. "We can all hope for such a world."

The Targaryen followed the Stark girl, watching her slip in and out of shadow. She noted Sansa's wariness and could not fault her for it. Daenerys had been born into the chaos of war and exile. Embodying the words of her House, she had fought her way to power through fire and blood. She had known the cruelties of the world for as long as she could remember. Sansa, however, had been born into a peaceful Summer to a loving family, in a secure and prosperous home, only to lose everything. Daenerys could never restore Sansa's family, but perhaps she could restore her hope.

The chill sharpened as they approached another trio of tombs. Daenerys gasped an icy gulp of air as she instinctively recognized the stone figures before her.

Sansa's steps slowed. She watched Daenerys' violet eyes, inky and troubled in the darkness, fall upon Lord Rickard Stark and his son Brandon, both murdered by Daenerys' father, the Mad King, trying to save the woman entombed beside them.

It was Lyanna Stark whom the Dragon Queen approached. Lyanna—kidnapped, raped and killed by Daenerys' "gentle" eldest brother Prince Rhaegar. Lyanna—whose loss Robert Baratheon launched a rebellion to avenge; a rebellion that destroyed Daenerys' family and doomed her to be born into exile. She felt a greater thrall than she had expected, before the bones of the woman whom she had never known, but whose destiny was so intimately intertwined with her own.

The torches crackled softly, throwing pools of light across the still faces of flesh and stone below. Daenerys heard only the pounding of her heart as she gazed upon Sansa's family…Jon's family—Rickard's solemn countenance, Brandon's imposing figure, dynamic even in death, and Lyanna-her oval face and round eyes so like Arya's, but with an enigmatic, restless charm all her own.

Shivering, the Queen reached out her pale hand. She suddenly glanced at Sansa, as if to ask permission, which the auburn-haired woman granted with an almost imperceptible nod.

Daenerys touched Lyanna's cold face, trying to reach back through time and understanding. This woman, defined by the violence, desire, and grief of men, was herself a cipher. What life had she dreamt of for herself? What dreams died with her?

The Targaryen queen searched the dead girl's face for answers, but Lyanna kept her secrets, shrouded in shadow. The firelight grew hot on Daenerys' skin, already flushed with the shame and confusion warring within her. She wondered for what seemed the hundredth time, why Ned Stark had fought to save her life—knowing nothing about her, except that her father and brother had murdered his family.

"Father said she was vivacious and strong-willed. He attributed it to the Stark "wolf-blood," Sansa observed, breaking the deep silence. "I think he meant she was as stubborn as Arya," she added with a wry laugh.

The silver-haired woman shot Sansa a strained smile as she stepped back from Lyanna, tucking her hand back into the folds of her heavy cloak.

"I always knew what my father and brother did to them," the queen said evenly. "But…I didn't know how it would feel to stand before their tombs…or to befriend Ned Stark's children."

"And yet, here we are," Sansa marveled quietly, almost to herself, taking her own measure of this moment, suspended at the hinge of past, present and future. The flames snapped, throwing shards of lights in the gloom. "Here we are," she repeated, her eyes shining brightly.

Her words hung in the frigid air, between the living and the dead.

As Sansa considered all she and Daenerys had lost, and all they had survived, to arrive at this most improbable and extraordinary moment, hope glimmered uncertainly within her, like the firelight flickering in the darkened crypt.


End file.
